Saturday, November 21, 2009

Birding Around Denver!

November 20, 2009

Richard Stevens:

Rebecca Kosten and I enjoyed a tremendous birding day on this fantastic fall day.

We started out looking unsuccessfully for the Barrow's Goldeneye at Lakecrest, Gateway Park (Adams County). Hundreds of Cackling Geese and Canada Geese were on the lake. Five Snow Geese and two Ross's Geese were also observed.

A resident talked about the goose problem. I mentioned that having 18 decoys on the lake probably does not help.

We also checked Emerald Strand Park (hundreds of White-cheeked Geese), Green Valley Ranch Recreation Pond (no geese) and Montbello Recreation Center Pond (no geese).

Next, we check the lakes south of Colorado Blvd and 88th Avenue. Here we relocated the Barrow's Goldeneye in the southwest corner of Tani Reservoir. A Long-tailed Duck was at the northwest side of Dahlia Pond. The "tame" Mute Swan was in the private pond north of Dahlia Pond (east of Dahlia and north of 88th Avenue).

The Great-tailed Grackles are still at the first house south of 152nd Avenue and Picadilly Road. No loons or uncommon gulls were found at Barr Lake (Adams).

The day was so nice that we decided to drive over to Cherry Creek Reservoir (Arapahoe) instead of ending our birding day. We were hoping to find the Barrow's Goldeneye reported yesterday.

This was a lucky, good decision. From the Bird Platform, Cottonwood Creek Loop I found at least 3 Common Loons and 1 Pacific Loon. At one time, I thought there were 5 loons, 2 of which were Pacific Loons. However, I never saw both at the same time and recorded only one.

While playing a Swamp Sparrow recording, a Virginia Rail jumped up on the dead log and scolded us for making so much noise!

An adult Lesser Black-backed Gull was not far off shore. I also believe there was a good possibly of a 1st cycle Lesser Black-backed Gull nearby. While watching these gulls, at least one Bonaparte's Gull flew by!

At the southwest marina, there were two huge dark gulls. Definitely, one was an adult Great Black-backed Gull and I thought the other to be a 1st cycle Great Black-backed Gull. The first cycle Gull looked much more like a Great Black-backed Gull than a Herring Gull. It was getting dark and I could only be "mostly sure".

I never located the male Barrow's Goldeneye reported yesterday.

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